Receipt printing mechanisms are ubiquitously found in many everyday machines, such as ATMs, gas pumps, food store check-out registers, retail establishment registers, etc. In many of these machines, the housing and associated drive mechanism for actuating the cutting blade to sever the receipts is quite large with respect to the blade itself. In addition, the housing and drive mechanism for the cutting blade is also particularly large with respect to the printing mechanism, which has become quite small with the advancements in this technology.
It would be desirable to miniaturize the cutting blade drive mechanism and housing in order to provide a receipt printer that is small and compact.
The present inventor has developed a new, miniaturized cutting blade mechanism and housing that is only approximately 60 millimeters in width. In fact, the housing of this miniature cutting mechanism is only slightly bigger than its guillotine knife cutting blade itself.
The blade is assembled within the housing, which comprises a small, low profile stepper motor. The stepper motor drives a rack and pinion mechanism, of which the rack is integral with the blade holder. That is, the rack is cut into the mid-section of the blade holder in order to reduce the height of the cutting mechanism. This rack arrangement also provides a direct drive for the cutting blade. The home switch for the cutting blade is also integrally disposed upon the cutting blade holder. This has the advantage of eliminating the need for assembly adjustments that were so common with prior art cutting mechanisms of this type. The stepper motor is very precise; it can be driven at a reduced stepper rate at the end of the cutting cycle. The reduced stepper rate is necessary in order to provide the required force to punch, rather than shear, the last six millimeters of the receipt that contacts the notch in the guillotine blade.